When the Horizon left the planet, they left behind a number of textbooks and technical manuals on how to make radio sets and other similar technology. The book that became most influential was a text published on Earth in 1992, called Chicago Mobs of the Twenties. This text became something of a "Bible" for the Iotian culture for decades to come. The Iotian population completely mimicked their society on the criminal underworld of Prohibition-era Chicago, that was described in great detail in the book.

The Horizon was lost shortly after it left Sigma Iotia II. As a result of Chicago Mobs of the Twenties, cultural development on the planet stalled to the 1920s Earth level, as planetary resources were wasted on endless gang wars between the different territories.

Iotian gangsters

In 2268, USS Enterprise came to visit the planet and to investigate the cultural contamination caused by the first contact, after the last radio messages of the Horizon were received by the Federation. In an attempt to manage the contamination and to steer the Iotian civilization to a more ethical path, CaptainJames T. Kirk of the Enterprise posed as a gangster and established a syndicate of the criminal organizations controlling the planet. He left Bela Okmyx, the Iotian crime boss of the Northside Territory, in charge and demanded an annual cut of 40% for the Federation. In reality, the 40% was to be put into the planetary treasury and used as a resource to guide the Iotians into adopting a more ethical system of government.

According to the comic "... Let's Kill All the Lawyers!," however, the Iotians never touched McCoy's communicator for fear of angering him and eventually returned it to him decades later; the society was still modeled on Chicago's gangs but was more peaceful and law-abiding.